I'm that Curtis Jobling, writer and illustrator. You may know me as designer of "Bob the Builder" (sorry) and creator of "Raa Raa the Noisy Lion" and "Frankenstein's Cat". I'm also the author of the "Wereworld" series of fantasy horror novels and the darkly comic YA thriller "Haunt". Published by Puffin, Penguin US, Simon & Schuster and Egmont around the world.

Wednesday, January 31, 2007

Whole Lottie Love!

Launch of the Jeanette Crizzle Trust went splendidly well on Monday. It was well attended by the press, politicians and public, so here's now hoping that the momentum continues and the Government push forward with their awareness/education programme on organ, blood and bone marrow donations. It occured to me on the day that as Patron of the Trust there was an even bigger synergy between this worthy cause and the thing I do that passes for a day job - Frankenstein's Cat, made of various body parts, and charities championing organ donation. A match made in heaven. If you can call by the website and give just a couple of minutes of your time to fill in the questionairre (quite painless and the information you give will certainly lead to helping saving lives) I and the Trust would really appreciate it.

In order to make FRANKENSTEIN'S CAT appeal to as wide a demographic as possible, we cleverly (at least I think we cleverly) introduced a female lead into the show, Lottie, the only girl in the village. If that sounds a little Little Britain then thats just fine, if a little parochial! So, while Nine doesn't fit in with the other Frankenpets (pictured below) because they're female, Lottie doesn't fit in with all the other kids at school because they're boys. It just so happens that she's better at all "boy activities" than the boys, but lack of that pesky all important "Y" chromosome means she's never going to be accepted.

So, in a very light and cartoony way we're touching upon bigotry with the show, albeit in an unnoticeable sublmininal knockabout comedy way. Hopefully.

The Frankenpets you see below are the original "male" version, Hyde the Hamster and Igor the Budgerigar. With the sex change came a name change - Heidi and Egora, which both work just fine for the show, still in keeping with Oddsburg.

Bushy - "The interaction of two or more agents or forces so that their combined effect is greater than the sum of their individual effects." What's wrong with that? Eeee, you're like my dad, you! Now if I'd said something like "incentivize" I'd agree with you...

Belf - I'm all out of the Cat books, alas, fella. I may have other picture books with me though, like SKELETON IN THE CLOSET. My talk is on the friday morning.

INJun, she is indeed, with a bit of my twin sister Karen thrown in for good measure. It's all in the glasses :-) She's actually changed along the way now into something that looks a touch older - it was decided the bunches aged her down.

Todd - thanks sir as ever

Something - "The only girl in the village" is a parochial joke from a UK comedy show, Little Britain. Only it's not a "girl" in the case of that show... :-D

About Me

Born in Blackpool and raised in Warrington. Designer and creator of various animated shows including BOB THE BUILDER, FRANKENSTEIN'S CAT and RAA RAA THE NOISY LION. Author of the WEREWORLD series, HAUNT, WORLD OF WARRIORS and MAX HELSING novels.